Reflections of Youth
by Cybra
Summary: Brain's jealous of Pinky sometimes.


Reflections of Youth  
By Cybra

**A/N:** Originally posted on my shared writing journal Candied Soup. There's a little bit of canon fudging in here. In "Snowball", Brain goes through the Acme Gene Splicer and Bagel Warmer with Snowball the hamster, but before he had a large but still normal head and a sweet temperament. In "Project B.R.A.I.N.", Brain goes through with Pinky, but before he had that huge head and would bite people. So I figured either it was a canonical mistake or Brain actually went through twice. I went with the latter.

**Disclaimer:** _Pinky and the Brain_ belongs to Steven Spielberg and Warner Brothers.

Sometimes, Brain was jealous of Pinky.

The taller mouse grew up in a pet shop with his parents. He'd had a loving family, a warm place to sleep, and good things to eat. His mother would nuzzle him when he was frightened, his father taught him everything he needed to know about being a mouse (which explained a lot), and he played all day with the empty spool he thought of as his sister.

Brain knew none of those things.

The shorter mouse had been born a field mouse, originally intended to grow up in the wild, his only dealings with man having to do with avoiding the local farmer. He supposed that the tin can he vaguely remembered had been warm in its own way. Perhaps his parents had made it so. Perhaps he had possessed brothers or sisters. Field mice were notorious for having large litters.

Yet…

The super intelligent mouse brought his knees to his chest and gazed up at the distant and faint stars, their light muted due to the city lights. The plan of the night had failed at about one thirty, leaving him ample time to think before the morons in white coats arrived. A paw rubbed at his aching knee, pushing a bit of white fur away from the tattoo on his leg.

It was the mark he had received the day he'd been taken away from the field. A part of the earliest memory he had, for he remembered nothing of a warm, loving childhood surrounded by family but only the first day surrounded by cold, unfeeling bars belonging to a laboratory cage. He remembered being held down, screeching in pain and terror as his leg was pricked again and again. And, when it was all over, finding a red circle with a letter A branded in the still-tender flesh. He'd cried for his mother and father, but they never came, and he soon forgot them with each new torture the enormous monsters in white coats brought forth.

He remembered meeting and befriending Snowball. He remembered the experiments that broke the tail his mother had once guided him by when he'd started to stray. He remembered the experiment that sent him first through the machine he grew to hate.

He clenched his teeth as he bowed his head. It was some time after that when Pinky arrived, an excitable mouse just in from the pet shop. He'd squeaked and cried, too, wanting to go back to his family. Brain had nipped at him, any good nature he'd had left stolen from him by the gene splicer. And for some weeks, he'd been forced to put up with the new mouse, for the stupid, hyperactive mouse seemed fascinated by his genetically enlarged head.

And then came Project B.R.A.I.N. with another trip through the gene splicer, and the rest was history.

While he was grateful for his intelligence, the entire experience a twisted gift in disguise, Brain wished he could turn back the clock and return to the field. He wanted a little more time to make some lasting memories. He wanted what Pinky had: a happy childhood. Memories of an entire lifetime of poking, prodding, and being subjected to unspeakable tortures haunted his dreams at night. While they fueled his desire to take over the world, giving him a want to never let it happen to someone else, he was tormented by the images. Always the net that scooped him up and away. Always the hands that held him down. Always the burning needle that branded his skin. Always the callous mistreatment done in a mockery of scientific curiosity.

Never the mother to soothe away his fears. Never the father to teach him to stand tall and proud. Never the care of a family.

Pinky had been molded with affection, surrounded by those who loved him. Brain had been forged with cruelty, surrounded by those who desired only what results he could give them.

The short mouse felt arms wrap around him and an unbroken tail sweep its way around his legs as the owner of both knelt down behind him, leaning against his back.

"You seem so sad. Poit. Is it because I screwed up the whatchamahoosit?"

He sighed. "No, Pinky. I just got a little lost in thought."

"About what?"

"The good old days." He allowed a bit of sarcasm to enter his voice. Pinky wasn't going to catch it.

"Um…Was that before or after we started trying to take over the world? Because it wasn't much fun before then."

Brain turned his head to catch the thinner mouse in his peripheral vision, narrowing his eyes curiously.

"I mean, I came here, and it was so lonely without Mom, Dad, and Sis. Then I met you, but we really didn't do too much. You were always so grouchy. Not that you're not now, but you didn't even want to play with me then. Then those scientists used that gene splicing thingy, and then we could do all sorts of fun fun silly willy things! Narf!"

As Pinky said this, the tail wrapped about Brain's legs started to thump against the ground much like a dog's would when happy. The super intelligent watched the pink appendage with interest.

Now that he thought about it, meeting Pinky had added a lot more laughter to his life…not mention a lot more headaches. The taller mouse provided companionship, comfort, and just about everything else he had lost on that terrible day. Meeting his parents hadn't filled a void. (The two field mice had only managed to annoy him to no end.) The far less intelligent mouse had filled it before he'd even allowed himself to acknowledge it.

Breathing deeply, this time more at peace, he disentangled himself from his partner in crime. "Come, Pinky. We must return to the cage and rest for tomorrow morning."

"Why, Brain? What are we doing in the morning?" Pinky stood as he did.

"The same thing we do every morning, Pinky: Run one of those furless baboons' insipid mazes," he replied with a roll of the eyes.

A pointless exercise he'd been forced to endure for most of the two years he'd been alive. However, he could bear it as long as he wasn't doing so alone.


End file.
